IN HIS IMAGE
In my image God whom I serve,
Would not be invincible, would lose His nerve;
In my image the Creator whom I worship,
Would forget mercy and choose not to forgive.
In my image the Holy One whom I adore,
Would obey what I say and expect nothing more;
In my image the wonderful Lord Jesus Christ,
Changes like the wind and won't recall what He said.
In my image the Truth I trust and believe,
Would shift like the sand beneath my feet;
In my image the Shepherd whom I follow,
Would leave me lost and forever alone.
But God who chose me to give Him my all,
Won't let me be ashamed, will not forget His call;
In His image my life continues to be shaped,
By the Only True God in whose grace I am saved.
J. E. POLLOCK
MAY 09, 2009
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From: "A Slice of Infinity" RZIM
Subject: Too Many Gods to Believe
Date: 1 May 2009 09:12:56 -0400
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Too Many Gods to Believe
"I am a former Christian minister who is now an agnostic--not an atheist, not a theist, not a sceptic, and certainly not indifferent." (1) So begins the story of Charles Templeton, one time rousing evangelist, friend and counterpart of Billy Graham, turned renounced believer, professed agnostic. He is quick to clarify the meaning of the title. "The agnostic does not say, as is commonly believed, "I do not know whether or not there is a God." He says, "I cannot know... He asserts that a combination of historic circumstances has made Christianity the dominant religion of the Western world but that it is not unique, there being a host of other religions and a variety of other deities worshipped or revered by millions of men and women in various parts of the world." (2)
In his final book, Farewell to God, Templeton describes the unraveling of more than twenty years of ministry and a faith that was steadily besieged by doubt. His objections range from scathing frustrations of irrational stories to pained confusions with the ways of the world and the God who supposedly cares for it. One question in particular remained with me throughout the book: "If God is a loving Father, why does he so seldom answer his needy children's prayers?" he asks. The question certainly isn't new to me, and like Templeton, I can rattle off an explanation based on scriptures I know by heart. But the picture that comes to life within this question is far more personal than any routine answer would satisfy. I have to wrestle through this question similarly to the way I had to wrestle with the presence and absence of my own father.
Elsewhere, Templeton critiques the world and its "abundance of gods," each with the curious requirement of unquestioning obedience as if it was the only god that mattered. He describes it a point of contention--even a point of absurdity--that in the vast sea of divine beings on this planet, Christianity proposes the idea that there is only one God. Across history, there are more gods than any of us can keep track of, and they seem to come with as many descriptions as the people who created them. On top of this, he argues, a great number of these gods come with qualities that leave much to be desired in the first place; they are jealous, hierarchical, vengeful, and demanding--and very much a product of our predecessors.
Many of these observations are troublingly undeniable. I was listening recently to a collection of interviews on the subject of spirituality. They asked hundreds of people the same question; simply, "Who is God?" But the answers were as diverse as the patches on a quilt, and the finished product was not at all a comforting blanket of great divinity, but little more than a mat of troubled chaos, gapping holes, and contradiction. Coming to the end of that message, I sighed deeply--how can anyone muddle through such a mess? We seem to make gods in our own images as fast as we can get them off the assembly line.
Templeton and the many who echo him are absolutely right to point out as troubling the sheer number and seeming characters of these divinities, who "hate every people but their own...[who] are jealous, vengeful...utter egotists and insist on frequent praise and flattery."(3) In fact, the prophet Jeremiah made a similar point. He called it a "discipline of delusion" to chase after gods as if it were a matter of preference and not a matter pertaining to what is real. "They are altogether stupid and foolish," he wrote of these individuals. "In their discipline of delusion--their idol is wood" (Jeremiah 10:8). The world of gods is indeed a chaotic place. And yet, isn't it somewhat hasty to reject every divinity in the room simply because there is more than one? In doing so, it would seem we use our own complaint against Christianity (it is arrogant to say there is only one God) as the reason to reject it (it is ridicu-lous that there is more than one god).
Further, the description of angry gods in abundance brings me back to the question that remained with me from the beginning. "If God is a loving Father, why does he so seldom answer his needy children's prayers?" The reason this question demands more than a pat answer is because it deals with disappointment, neglect, silence, and heartache. The question pulls on the shirtsleeve of a vital relationship. Perhaps it is subtle, but the question itself seems to point to something inherently different about this God--something that sets this Father significantly apart from the sea of divine chaos. The gods Templeton and many others describe do not at all seem like gods we would miss if they were far away. They are not the kind of gods we would be saddened by if they were silent, or dare to be angry with if they disappointed us. Like all children with parents that we do not always understand, sometimes we ask questions that aren't entirely fair (or even sensible). And sometimes we ask questions that give away the relational presence of the one we wrestle with under the surface.
I believe it is more than helpful to recognize the human capacity to create gods and chase after delusion. But so I think it is vital to recognize that not all gods are created equal, and there is reason to believe there might be one who isn't created at all.
Jill Carattini is managing editor of A Slice of Infinity at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Atlanta, Georgia.
(1) Charles Templeton, Farewell to God: My Reasons for Rejecting the Christian Faith (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1996), 18.
(2) Ibid.
(3) Ibid., 22-23.
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